B-2 Costs to Escalate, AF Figures Show

The B-2 stealth bombers will cost more than $530 million each, according to cost figures declassified Friday by the Air Force, but Rep. Les Aspin (D-Wis.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, quickly predicted that the aircraft and its production costs “won’t fly” in Congress.

The service plans to build 132 of the radar-evading planes at a total cost of $70 billion, an increase from an earlier estimate of $67.7 billion. The Air Force has already spent $17.3 billion on the B-2 and has requested $39 billion for the program over the next five years, including about $8 billion a year in the early 1990s when production will be at its peak.

According to Air Force year-by-year figures, while the Bush Administration had planned to slow costs for the B-2 over the next three years, it would sharply increase B-2 spending from $5.3 billion in 1991 and $7.8 billion in 1992 to $8.4 billion in 1993, or roughly the same amount in 1993 as planned by the Ronald Reagan Administration.

“We will not spend $7 billion to $8 billion a year for B-2 in its three peak funding years,” Aspin said.